Law: Teachers must disclose crimes by Dec. 27

Teachers and other school employees no longer can keep past serious crime convictions or arrests under wraps, according to a state law that kicked in last month.

Public school employees have until Dec. 27 to fill out a form disclosing any arrests or convictions of serious crimes.

Prospective employees already are required to make that disclosure, as they are subject to a state and federal criminal background check.

But Pennsylvania only began requiring state criminal background checks for prospective employees in 1986. The federal background checks have been required since 2006.

That means longtime employees might

never have had to disclose a serious crime.

Under the law, current employees must be fired and be banned from school employment for life if they have been convicted of one of 27 crimes such as homicide, aggravated assault or rape. They would lose their teaching certification as well, if applicable.

The law covers any employee, from administrators to janitors. If a person refuses to fill out the form, the district performs a criminal background check. If a person lies on the form and hides something, he or she is subject to dismissal and criminal charges.

The serious crimes list includes new additions, including luring a child into a vehicle or structure; using minors to sell drugs; sexually exploiting a minor; having sex with an animal; institutional sexual assault; and unlawful contact with a minor.

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Timing: And it doesn't matter if the arrest or conviction was last year or 30 years ago -- the employee must tell the district about it.

"The main goal of this law is to err on the side of caution," said Department of Education spokesman Tim Eller.

Eller said the department has made no estimates on how many employees will be affected. The offenses must be reported regardless of where they occurred in the United States or around the world.

A district is required to dismiss employees, regardless of tenure, if they disclose they have been convicted of one of those crimes.

Additionally, the law is much more direct about driving under the influence offenses. Someone convicted of DUI two or more times in the past three years is banned from school employment for the next three years.

A school district has authority on what discipline to take with a current employee who has a past DUI, Eller said. But now the employee has to disclose the conviction.

And to make sure public schools don't have this problem of veiled backgrounds in the future, all employees from this point on have 72 hours to disclose to the district any arrest or conviction that falls under the law's purview.

Once employees submit the forms, districts are expected to "swiftly" deal with dismissals and other disciplinary action, Eller said.

Schools comply: Superintendents at Dover and Dallastown school districts said they don't foresee any issues with their staff complying with the law.

Dover's Robert Krantz said staff members are getting the forms now, and he doesn't believe his staff has "anything to hide."

Still, he said, he questions why only public school employees are subject to the disclosure, and not others who come in contact with children, such as utility workers who come to homes.

Dallastown's Stewart Weinberg agreed, saying lawmakers should have to do likewise.

York County's close-knit communities likely would have weeded out anybody's criminal past, Weinberg said. He's had cases of staff members with a DUI who self-reported it, too.

"We're not expecting any surprises. We have a great staff. We have a very law-abiding staff," Weinberg said.

Protecting children: The law was sponsored by state Sen. Jeffrey Piccola, R-Dauphin.

"There is more concern about the employment of adults than the safety of kids," Piccola said in explaining why he proposed the legislation.

Piccola said a 2005 Steelton-Highspire High School incident, in which a hall monitor was fired for having sexual contact with students, sparked the changes. It was discovered afterward that the hall monitor had a conviction for cocaine distribution.

People who have serious crime convictions on their records "shouldn't have been employed in the first instance," Piccola said.

The state teachers' union has promised to comply with the law and support the intent of the law, according to Pennsylvania State Higher Education spokesman Wythe Keever.

But the union takes exception to the state's interpretation. Keever said the union believes the law only requires reporting of convictions, not arrests.

The form all public school employees must fill out makes them list arrests related to any serious crimes.

"That's inconsistent with the law," Keever said.

A full list of the crimes and more information about the law can be found at http://bit.ly/PABackground.